<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Proximity by Antigone_Sycamore</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325816">Proximity</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antigone_Sycamore/pseuds/Antigone_Sycamore'>Antigone_Sycamore</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Steel [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek: Voyager</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>BAMF Kathryn Janeway, Boxing &amp; Fisticuffs, Chakotay's POV, Episode: s05e11 Latent Image, F/M, Fluff, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Light Angst, No Beta, One Shot, Smut, There already is a tag for that?, poor chakotay</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 05:33:35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,622</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24325816</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antigone_Sycamore/pseuds/Antigone_Sycamore</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to "Distance". Can be read as a stand-alone piece. Janeway is one serious gung ho kind of gal. He should have known that.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Chakotay/Kathryn Janeway</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Steel [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1756198</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>62</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Proximity</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Torri012/gifts">Torri012</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Truly, I’m standing on the shoulders of giants in this fandom anyway. </p><p>Inspired by Torri012’s glorious comment on my previous story, that Chakotay wouldn’t be able to pin Janeway down in a fight, even if he did try. I concur. </p><p>Set in season 5, after the events of “Latent Image”. Obviously NSFW. You’ve been warned.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>***</p><p>Chakotay doesn’t hear the familiar <i>swoosh</i> with which the hydraulic doors to holodeck 2 slide apart, his own surroundings almost completely drowned out by the loud drumming of blood in his ears. </p><p>He sidesteps his holographic opponent, effectively blocks and deflects his next shots before he launches into a counterattack with a volley of fast strikes. <i>Left right, left right, repeat.</i> </p><p>It is only when he hears the familiar sound of her heels approach his boxing ring over the smooth floor of the otherwise empty holodeck that he becomes fully aware of her presence.</p><p>He shoots her a brief glance from within the ring - defense fully up, sweat stinging in his eyes - to acknowledge the presence of his captain, but he doesn’t pause the program. They haven’t been on easy terms lately, the strain of the past couple of weeks manifesting itself between them in her short temper and his constant irritation. He knows she is under a lot of pressure - to put it mildly - and he’ll be dammed if he doesn’t do his best to tolerate her mood swings; to offer her a place to put her anger. But he didn’t block an hour on the holodeck in the middle of the night for no reason. Tonight, when neither peace nor sleep come easy, he wants to beat the shit out of someone until he feels the familiar exhaustion creep into his joints and muscles and he doesn’t have to think about it anymore. Tonight, sweaty and exhausted from round after round of sparring, yet still slightly on edge, he actually resents her intrusion.</p><p>Kathryn, however, with her usual nerve, pushes right past his defiance and steps up to the elevated platform of his boxing ring. She places herself directly at the side of the ring, lips pressed together in a firm line, her long fingers curling around the ropes on either side of her body. She glares at him with one slightly raised eyebrow. He spares her another glance, looks her over more properly. She’s still in uniform at 0200 hours, mascara slightly smudged below her blue eyes. She looks exhausted - more so than usual. Skin sheer and eyes pale beneath the bright holodeck lights, her usually immaculate hair now slightly out of place. He knows she’d been on the holodeck with the Doctor for the past 16 hours or so. After their aggravating encounters with Kashyk’s crew of the Devore inquisition left everyone on board clearly on edge, the Doctor’s refusal to let the compromised memory files in his program be deleted is only the latest crises on their hands. Kathryn, of course, despite his repeated objection, has taken it upon herself to stay with the Doctor for as long as the multitude of her other responsibilities will allow, alternating between her shifts on the bridge, a couple hours of sleep and keeping the Doctor company; refusing to be relieved by someone else. </p><p>Despite his own irritation, her somewhat disheveled appearance does give him pause - she is, after all, always his first priority - no matter the wreckage. Chakotay, pondering his <i>first officer’s duty</i> to rein her back in, isn’t paying attention properly when his jaw suddenly collides with his opponent’s bandaged fist - <i>hard</i> - and he’s knocked several steps back.</p><p>He swears under his breath, running the back of his hand along his jaw on instinct. With the holodeck’s safety protocols on-line the impact is not really that painful, but the embarrassment of quite literally having let his guard down in her presence is already searing low and hot in his gut.</p><p>He’s about to regroup, not sparing her another glance, when her authoritative voice cuts through the silence,</p><p>“Computer. Freeze program.” </p><p>In the opposite corner of the ring, his holographic sparring partner stops in his tracks. Chakotay pushes a leveled breath between his lips, mindful to check his own temper before he turns to her, hands to hips, trying to catch his breath.</p><p>“Kathryn,” he says casually, addressing her by her given name rather than her title because at the very least, he thinks, it will piss her off.</p><p>To his surprise the ghost of a coy smile flickers across her face, lifting the exhaustion of off her for the split of a second, and it is almost enough to sooth his strained temper. She’s been in a strange mood lately. He doesn’t know exactly what transpired between her and the Devore inspector, isn’t sure he wants to know, but the encounter has clearly left her even more restless than usual.</p><p>“How’s the Doctor?” he asks, since he can’t ask the other.</p><p>She runs a hand under her tiered eyes, further smudging her makeup as the fingers of her other hand tighten around the rope.</p><p>“I don’t know,” she admits with a frustrated sigh, looking at the floor of the ring where the shock absorbing canvas cover bears the arrowhead-shaped pennant of the Starfleet insignia - a default style setting in the holodeck’s database which he simple hasn’t bothered to change over the years. </p><p>Her hand returns to the rope as she finally lifts her gaze to his. </p><p>“Every time I think I have it all under control-,” she trails off again, one of her hands motioning into the empty space in front of her, as if he and his boxing ring were at the heart of her problems. </p><p>Chakotay shifts his weight from one foot to the other, repressing the urge to clench his hands into fists. She still hasn’t clarified why she sought him out in the middle of the night on the holodeck, nor has she apologized for the intrusion, but it is unlike her to stall when something is so clearly on her mind. </p><p>“The Doctor will be fine,” he says, the instinct to reassure her outweighing his persisting annoyance. </p><p>Kathryn fixes him with a look, steel-blue eyes bright and unreadable, before she ducks between the ropes and enters the ring. Chakotay holds his ground as she makes her way past him to the small chair in the other corner of the boxing ring, where he keeps the extra set of bandages and a bottle of water. She picks up the bandages, ponders them between her fingers.</p><p>“There are people who would relish the opportunity of having their memory wiped after an experience as traumatic as the Doctor’s,” she says tightly, not looking at him. She puts the bandages back down before she lifts her eyes to his again, “I guess there are no easy ways out in the Delta Quadrant.”</p><p>She turns without another word, ducking back between the ropes of the ring.</p><p>Chakotay finally gives in to the impulse to clench his fists. It does nothing to quench the next. Her name is over his lips again before he knows it.</p><p>“Kathryn.” </p><p>He adds a smirk, for good measure, mindful of his next words and very much aware that he is being <i>way</i> out line, “Sounds like you need to blow off some steam,” <i>and</i>, just because he is <i>absolutely</i> certain that she will turn him down, “care to join me?”</p><p>Kathryn quirks an eyebrow at him. </p><p>Even after all these years she is still able to surprise him. He’s been sitting by her side on <i>Voyager’s</i> bridge for what feels like a lifetime already. Her defiant unrelenting presence beside him a steady reminder of the choices they’ve made, of the boundaries they’ve drawn, crossed and redrawn. But now something he can’t quite  pinpoint charges across her face, something visceral and decidedly <i>unchecked</i>.</p><p>She ducks back between the ropes, and reaches for the magnetic clasp of her uniform jacket. Before he knows what’s happening she has discarded it over the ropes along with the undershirt, revealing toned thin arms and defined shoulder blades beneath the gray Starfleed issued tank top. </p><p>Chakotay sucks in a breath, effectively failing to hide his <i>agitation</i>. </p><p><i>Get a grip, man,</i> he thinks to himself, but the sight of her bare arms does very little to sooth his already strained temper. </p><p>Kathryn levels another look his way as she steadily approaches his position and comes to a halt directly in front of him. He looks down on her. Even with their difference in height not as pronounced - she’s still wearing her heels - he’s at least a head taller than she is. Chakotay fails to suppress the smile spreading across his lips. It is just like her to take on a fight against the odds. Kathryn, seemingly able to read his mind, brings her hands up for cover, widening her stance with a dangerous glint suddenly forming behind the steel-blue of her eyes. </p><p>Chakotay, about to reconsider the wisdom of this whole endeavor, brings his own defense up on instinct, just barely in time to block her first shot. </p><p>He sidesteps the next, immediately on the defensive. She’s quick to withdraw, popping back out immediately after each strike, mindful of the edge his elevated height and reach give him over her.</p><p>Chakotay, somewhat flustered by the situation at hand and already struggling to keep her in check, tries to snatch her wrists the next time she comes in, abandoning his own defense in the attempt. He manages to grab one of them but isn’t able to block her next shot.</p><p>Kathryn makes the opportunity count, aiming for center with admirable precision. </p><p>“Try to keep up, Commander.”</p><p>Struggling not to lose his balance, he lets go of her wrist. It belatedly occurs to him that he hasn’t accounted for her <i>extremely</i> competitive nature. Over the course of their five year journey, there isn’t even one <i>single</i> thing he’s witnessed her do that she didn’t excel at. From captaining a starship to performing ballet – Kathryn Janeway doesn’t half-ass anything. If she picks something up, she masters it. And she beats everybody else to it. It worries him sometimes how he’s <i>ever</i> supposed to keep up with her. </p><p>So, when her bare fist collides with his jaw with much more force than advisable or necessary in any holodeck sparring session, it dawns on him that she isn’t screwing around, which, he thinks, he should’ve known better. She pretty much <i>never</i> is. </p><p>He runs the back of his bandaged hand over his jaw, where she just tagged him, painfully reminded that she is not only trained in the use of all kinds of hand phasers, phaser rifles, small artillery as well as attack and defense patterns of minor and major starships, but also was at one point the recipient of extensive Starfleet hand-to-hand combat training; had even been deployed into active armed conflicts defending Federation outposts against Cardassians. Plus, just like any of them, relying entirely on their own forces out here in the Delta Quadrant, she does take part in Tuvok’s regular on-board survival drills to keep in shape.</p><p>So, technically, he really should have known that it would be a bad idea to get her into a fight; that she’d be dead set on kicking his ass, if he challenged her.</p><p>Chakotay panics for a second or two - what is he supposed to do? Deck her? - but before he can form any coherent strategy to get him out of this situation, Kathryn surges forward again, breathing hard now, obviously sensing another opening in his hesitation. </p><p>He barely manages to block her again before his own survival training finally kicks in. If she isn’t screwing around, neither will he. He pushes in close, directly in her line of fire, his own defense firmly set in place this time. Not letting himself think about it too much, he drives down for her waist in a straight line, trying to grab her legs and tackle her to the ground. He feels her small hands gripping for purchase along his own sweat-drenched Federation issued gray shirt, tearing at it as she goes directly for his neck, trying to disrupt his own balance. He manages to get one of her legs as she takes a step back with the other in an attempt to lower her center of gravity. Chakotay grits his teeth, jaw locked firmly in place, ignoring the painful stabs of her sharp elbows against his shoulder blades - he’s certain she will leave bruises. He picks up her leg and tackles her to the ground, his own body following hers, crashing down on top of her.</p><p>They hit the ring with an angry grunt on her part, directly on top of <i>Voyager’s</i> Starfleet insignia, both of them breathing hard now. </p><p>Chakotay, already wary of her imminent retaliation, blocks her body with his, trying to allow her as little movement as possible without pinning her down by using his full weight. He struggles to snatch her wrists again, but Kathryn, quite literally, beats him to it.</p><p>If anyone were to walk in on them right now, they would think they’ve lost their minds. The captain and her first officer wrestling with each other on the holodeck - yet, when he comes to think about it, there are probably people on this ship who wouldn’t be all that surprised. The apparent tension between them is bound to find an outlet; one way or another. He’s certain that even Tuvok has picked up on it by now.</p><p>He needs to get her arms out of the way, pin them down above her head, or he’s certain she’ll give him a black eye if she keeps this up – and wouldn’t <i>that</i> look bad on the bridge the next morning? -  But Kathryn’s tense body already pushes up against him as one of her hands tightens around his triceps. The other grips his wrist. Her elbows are tucked tightly to her rips to allow him as little lateral movement as possible, her breath swallow and her jaw locked firmly in place. She tenses her whole body, the muscles in her shoulders stretching visibly beneath her skin. Strands of her auburn hair - much longer now than when she had first cut it off a year or so ago - fall into her eyes and stick to her forehead. Chakotay tries not to get distracted by the faint glimmer of sweat that forms above her eyebrows.</p><p>Her eyes flash to his and he <i>knows</i> he is in trouble.</p><p>The look she’s wearing is usually reserved for hostile aliens or insubordinate crew members. He’s seen it many times before, standing at attention by her side on <i>Voyager’s</i> bridge, in her ready room, on the deck of a Borg cube. Pupils blown wide, the steel blue of her eyes is blazing with the heated kind of determination he’s come to associate with her, <i>and only with her</i>. </p><p>He’s managed to properly piss her off now.</p><p><i>Still</i>. Chakotay fights the impulse to loosen his own grip on her, using the weight of his upper body to block her movements. He’s still not exactly sure what this is all about - or how his private late night holodeck sparring session escalated into a full-on wrestling match with his captain of all people. But he trusts her with every fiber of his being to know, that he would <i>never</i> hurt her; to <i>know</i>, that it would only take one <i>single</i> word from her to send him all the way across the room, <i>completely</i> mortified.</p><p>Apparently, the feeling isn’t mutual. Kathryn, true to form, tightens her bench vise grip around the triceps and the wrist of his right arm as she hooks on of her feet behind his own legs. She pushes up her hip, using leverage from her back. With one skilled motion, she turns both of them around.</p><p>It is not one of his proudest moments. Before Chakotay even knows what is happening, she’s towering above him, straddling his hips, using the full weight of her small body to pin him down.</p><p>He drags in a breath. And another one. <i>And another one.</i> It’s not nearly enough. </p><p>Kathryn pushes against his chest, her own rapidly rising and falling with every measured inhale and exhale. Her long legs tight like a vise on either side of his body as her hair falls into her eyes again, close enough for the auburn strands to brush over his own face now.</p><p>Chakotay feels panic bubble up again, hot and searing, from deep within his guts, almost visceral and blinding this time. He <i>has to</i> get her off of him. <i>Now.</i> And it is not because he fears she’ll try to pummel him again, but because of what his treacherous body and his loose gym shorts will undoubtedly reveal to her, if she keeps pressing down on him like that.</p><p>Kathryn must see the clear flicker of panic across his face. For the first time since she entered the holodeck, she hesitates. </p><p>“Chakotay,” she rasps, and it is only a <i>very</i> small comfort that she sounds just as dazed as he feels.</p><p><i>Oh for fucks sake</i>. He blindly grasps for her arms again, <i>erratic</i> this time; no trace left of his previously restrained and calculated movements. He manages to take hold of one of her wrists. The other one is pressing down over his chest as Chakotay tries to push his body upwards against her, out of the vigorous grasp she has on him, when his eyes flash to her face again.</p><p>She’s beautiful like that, he thinks. She <i>always</i> is beautiful, that is, but with her flushed face and her taunt body pressing down on him, wild eyes a wide deep blue sea against the porcelain sheer skin of her face - she looks like something out of this world entirely.</p><p>There is nothing Chakotay can do to stop the blood from pooling hot and low in his groin. Beneath his loose gym shorts he feels himself twitch against her. And from the way Kathryn suddenly hisses between gritted teeth, she can feel it, too.</p><p>She stills above him for the fracture of a second and he can hear her breath catch. But Kathryn doesn’t falter – not even for a moment. </p><p>She fixes him with another look, the steel blue of her eyes flaring with the same heated determination he’d seen before, then her hips bear down on him again with a <i>distinct</i> roll as she braces her small elegant fingers against his chest. </p><p>She catches herself on the far end of a sigh that already sounds dangerously close to a moan.</p><p>Chakotay briefly wonders if this, is in fact, what it had been all about since the moment she’d set foot on the holodeck a couple of minutes ago. They haven’t crossed this particular front line in quite some time - not since ranks and protocols had been of no consequence to either of them. It extends between the two of them like their very own demarcated area; its course painfully etched into Chakotay’s every memory of her. Crossing it now <i>is</i> bound to draw fire. </p><p>In one last futile attempt to contain the inevitable fallout of this <i>very</i> far gone off the rails holodeck sparring session, Chakotay pushes his whole body up against her as his own hands blindly grip for purchase along her narrow waist. He’s about to yank her off his hips, when he feels the palm of her small hand settle firmly across his sternum, pushing back with intent. Her warm fingers sprawled right above his heart. The motion takes him aback. So much, his already sore heart stalls painfully beneath her palm. It’s a gesture she has used countless times before - sometimes reaching out across a distance so vast he wouldn’t have known how to bridge it without her. In fact, she’s the only person who’s ever touched him quite like that - capable of creating an intimacy and warmth seemingly out of nowhere - just never with as much pressure or emphasizes as she is using now.</p><p>He looks up at her again.</p><p>“Chakotay-,” she presses in-between clenched teeth, chest rapidly rising and falling with every measured inhale and exhale, “just-“</p><p>For a couple of seconds their elevated breathing is the only audible sound around them. Then Chakotay relents his grip around her waist and lets both of her small hands push him all the way to the matt, the rush of blood drumming loudly in his ears. Kathryn follows his body down without hesitation, her strong legs tightening on either side of his hip.</p><p>It only sinks all the way to the bottom of his adrenaline clouded mind, what exactly is about to go down, when her coarse voice cuts through the silence again, only inches above his own face.</p><p>“Computer. Seal holodeck two. Authorization Janeway Pi one-one-zero.”</p><p>The computer, at least, complies without resistance as the familiar <i>beeps</i> confirm the execution of her insane command.</p><p>Chakotay reaches up on instinct, pulls her head down to his and bites her lip; almost hard enough to draw blood. Her whole body surges forward at the sensation, bearing down on him with another <i>unmistakable</i> roll of her hips. This time, she makes no attempt to conceal her moan.</p><p>His hands travel down her body, over the drenched tank top – there is nothing tender in the frenzied way their hands grip at each other, nothing soft in the almost desperate thrust of her hip against his still clothed crotch. Chakotay recognizes her need for what it is and he fully intends to match her inch for inch. </p><p>He reaches down between her legs, to where her hands are already struggling with the claps of her uniform pants. </p><p>“No fingers,” she admonishes as she bats his hand away because, of course, Kathryn <i>bloody</i> Janeway has to be the only person in the whole universe who has to have rules and regulations and parameters about <i>everything</i>. </p><p>She pushes out of her pants, more gray Starfleed issued underwear and regulation boots following along with it, before she settles against him again. He lifts his hip off the ground to give her more room to make equally swift work of his gym shorts.  </p><p>He’s almost painfully hard when Kathryn sinks down on him all the way in one swift unrelenting motion, her hands braced on either side of his head, leaving him no time at all to adjust to the overwhelming sensation of her insane heat around him. He feels the shudder that runs through her whole body, hears her breath catch - if he’s thought he wouldn’t be able to keep up with her in hand-to-hand combat, he’s in real trouble now. But she stills for a moment, pushing a measured breath out through her nose and he can tell that she’s fighting for control herself.</p><p>He vividly remembers the last time they’ve done this; the morning before Tuvok’s humming voice filtered through the distinct static of their long range com-link. It had been all soft and careful touches back then; nothing at all like the frenzied heated way Kathryn Janeway is tearing at his gym cloth right now. But Chakotay had already known back then, too, that he’d never be able to contain her; that she belonged among the stars, far too indomitable to be weighed down by the sorrow already heavy in his own heart.</p><p>It had been foolish to attempt to hold her down then, as it was foolish to attempt to hold her down now - Chakotay knows he has nothing to match the iron kind of strength Kathryn Janeway carries beneath her small frame.</p><p>He grits his teeth, gripping on to her buttocks to anchor himself somewhere in reality, and pulls her forward against him. The sound she makes almost sends him over the edge then and there. Her whole upper body straightens as she closes her eyes, throws her head back and finally relents control. It is the hottest thing he’s ever seen in his entire life. The ivory lines of her long exposed neck and collarbone, nipples peaking hard against the gray Starfleet issued tank top that she’s still wearing, eyebrows drawn together in concentration. She’s beyond beautiful. He fights the urge to give himself over to the white heat forming behind his eyes - not wanting to miss even the fracture of a second, even though he already knows with a dead certainty that this image of Kathryn Janeway will haunt him for the rest of his life. </p><p>Beyond that, Chakotay abandons all coherent thought as his instincts take over completely. He fiercely matches each and every thrust of her hip until Kathryn’s sharp cries bounce off the walls of the holodeck loud and clear enough to be heard on the upper deck. He surges upwards, meeting no resistance this time, bringing their bodies in an upright position again, driving both of them over the edge.</p><p>Kathryn comes with a cry that is only muffled when she bites down on his shoulder; hard enough that he’s certain this time she’s actually drawn blood.</p><p>For a couple of seconds there is only white blazing heat as he shudders through his own orgasm. The feeling of her clenching muscles around him wipping out an entire universe.</p><p>They tumble to the ground again, both panting hard, her still atop him, forehead resting on his bruised shoulder as she tries to catch her breath.</p><p>He has no idea how long they are lying there, in the middle of his boxing ring, right on top of <i>Voayager’s</i> Starfleet insignia, his holographic sparring partner still frozen in the other corner – oblivious to the momentous obliteration of year-long forged boundaries that just occurred.</p><p>Of course, Kathryn is the first to move. She lifts her head off of his shoulder with an expression he can only describe as….<i>quizzical</i>.</p><p>Chakotay lifts an eyebrow in turn, not yet trusting himself to speak.</p><p>“Well,” she says dryly, and he does have to give her credit for sounding so composed already, “that escalated quickly.”</p><p>Chakotay squeezes his eyes shut with a grunt, trying to block out the universe that already resumes its spinning course around him.</p><p>He feels her fingers tenderly brush against his cheek and over his lips. The softness of her touch a stark contrast to their earlier frenzy. </p><p>He opens his eyes again and finds her looking at him. Her gaze falls to his shoulder, to where he can feel his sore muscles throbbing around the bite marks she’s left, and something else entirely flickers across her face. <i>Something bottomless and untamable itself.</i></p><p>“I’m sorry, Chakotay,” she says and he can already see the emotional fallout form in the familiar crease between her eyebrows before she drops her head back to his shoulder. He runs a hand down the small of her back, firm pressure along her spine, his own heart already tight with pain.</p><p>“You’re too hard on yourself,” he tells her, because it’s true, and because he isn’t sure what it is exactly, she’s apologizing for, and – for good measure - “and on me, too.” </p><p>It earns him a look. A fleeting image of the captain flickering across her flushed face, already assessing the situation. Still buried deep inside of her, it takes all of his remaining restraint not to laugh out loud. It really is absurd, this constant tug-of-war between the two of them amidst all the other conflicts of their marooned starship. But he knows nothing else. So instead, Chakotay sighs and runs a hand down her spine and over her sweat-soaked tank top, bracing himself for her final blow for the night. This time, he thinks, whatever happens next, he won’t fight her.</p><p>***</p><p><i>“Das schwerste Gewicht beugt uns nieder, erdrückt uns, presst uns zu Boden. In der Liebeslyrik aller Zeiten aber sehnt sich die Frau nach der Schwere des männlichen Körpers. Das schwerste Gewicht ist also gleichzeitig ein Bild intensivster Lebenserfüllung. Je schwerer das Gewicht, desto näher ist unser Leben der Erde, desto wirklicher und wahrer ist es.”</i> - Milan Kundera, Die unerträgliche Leichtigkeit des Seins.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Three things. 1. Kathryn Janeway is <i>one serious</i> gung ho kind of gal and I didn’t realize just how bad my decade long girl crush on her really is until I started writing this fic. 2. I have no idea if Tuvok stages regular on-board survival drills, but he sure as hell should. 3. I don’t know shit about boxing and it might show.</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>